Reprinted from

PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING®
The Official Magazine of ISPE Batch Process Simulation
July/August 2006, Vol. 26 No. 4

This article
describes the Debottlenecking of a Batch
use of a batch
process Pharmaceutical Cream Production
simulator in the
modelling and
debottlenecking by Jully Tan, Dominic Chwan Yee Foo,
of an anti- Sivakumar Kumaresan, and Ramlan Abdul Aziz
allergic cream
production line
at an existing
pharmaceutical
facility.

C
Introduction
omputer Aided Process Design (CAPD)
and simulation tools have been widely
used in the bulk and petrochemical
industries since the early 1960s. It
involves the use of computers to perform steady-
state heat and mass balancing as well as sizing
and costing calculations for a process.1 How-
ever, the use of these CAPD and simulation
tools has only emerged in pharmaceutical
manufacturing in the past decade.2-8 Compared
to the readily available process simulators in
the bulk and petrochemical industries, there
are only a limited number of simulators avail-
able for pharmaceutical process modelling. This
situation is mainly due to the uncommon unit
operations and the batch operation nature of
pharmaceutical processing. Due to its rela-
tively new emergence, more work needs to be
done in this sector.
Due to the increasing customer demand of
the anti-allergic cream product, the pharma-
ceutical facility management team was looking
for alternative expansion schemes to increase
the current production rate as the production
capacity was limited by the current operating
condition and equipment setup. Hence, a
debottlenecking study is needed for an increase
in production. In addition, the debottlenecking
study will assist the management team in fu-
ture expansion plans.
Background Theory
In order to increase production throughput,
process bottlenecks that limit the current pro-
duction need to be identified. Bottlenecks are
process limitations that are related to either
equipment or resources (e.g., demand for vari-
ous utilities, labor, and raw material). Hence,
process debottlenecking can be defined as the
identification and removal of obstacles in the
attempt to increase the plant throughput.5 In
batch manufacturing, two types of process
bottlenecks can be categorized. These are the
equipment capacity-related size bottleneck (an
equipment that is limited in size) as well as the
scheduling bottleneck (due to the long occu-
pancy of a piece of equipment during a process).

Figure 1. Base case

simulation flowsheet for
the production of anti-
allergic cream.

©Copyright ISPE 2006 JULY/AUGUST 2006 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING 1

 Batch Process Simulation
The ability to identify and remove process bottlenecks that
create obstacles in a manufacturing process will increase
plant throughput and fulfill customer needs.
A good tool to identify batch process bottleneck is via a
throughput analysis study. Throughput analysis measures
the equipment utilization in a batch process with two vari-
ables, i.e., the capacity utilization and equipment uptime.5-6
Capacity utilization is defined as the percentage of the
current operating load of a piece of equipment (e.g., vessel
volume for a reactor or filtering area of a filter) relative to its
maximum load. For instance, a vessel with 100% capacity
utilization means that its current content has reached its
maximum level.
Equipment uptime measures the effectiveness of a piece of
equipment that is utilized in time. It is given as the percent-
age of the equipment utilization time over the plant cycle
time. For example, a reactor that operates for five hours
within a plant with a cycle time of 10 hours has an uptime of
50%. The product of equipment capacity utilization and its
uptime defines the combined utilization of the respective
equipment.5-6
In an ideal situation, a plant should have all equipment
running at 100% combined utilization to achieve maxi-
Figure 2. Operation Gantt Chart for the base case simulation.
2 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING JULY/AUGUST 2006
mum production. However, this is often not the case. All
process equipment will normally feature different utiliza-
tion. The ability to raise utilization of the equipment will
help in raising process throughput. The processing step
with the highest combined utilization is normally identi-
fied as the first candidate for process debottlenecking.
Simulation tools that are capable of tracking capacity
utilization and equipment uptime can facilitate the iden-
tification of process bottlenecks and the development of
the scenarios for process debottlenecking. By using the
“what if” scenario, process alternatives can be simulated
via the use of simulation tools to reveal potential candi-
dates for the debottlenecking study.
The Cost Benefit Ratio (CBR) is among the criteria that
can be used to evaluate the economic performance of
debottlenecking alternatives. As the name suggests, CBR is
a measure based on the ratio of benefits obtained for a given
expansion cost.9 The first step in CBR analysis is to deter-
mine the beneficial elements, disbenefits, and expansion cost
for a project. For the case of pharmaceutical process debottle-
necking, CBR formulation can be defined as shown in the
following equation:
©Copyright ISPE 2006

Revenue of
Revenue of – current
alternative operation
CBR = __________________________________________ (1)
Investment Operating Operating
cost of + cost of – cost of
alternative alternative current
operations
Model Development –
Antiallergic Cream Production
Figure 1 shows the base case simulation flowsheet for the
production of anti-allergic cream modelled in a process simu-
lator.10 The base case simulation model was developed to
reflect the actual operating condition in the existing pharma-
ceutical manufacturing facility that is operated in batch
processing mode. This modelling environment, involves the
modelling of a few operations that take place sequentially in
a single unit procedure.10 For instance, the Jacketed Heater
procedure P-1 in the Pre-Mixing section - Figure 1 was used
to model the sequential operations of raw material charges,
material heating (for melting purpose), agitation processes,
as well as product discharge. All these individual operations
took place in the single vessel of V-101. The modelling of these
single operations is described next.
In the base case process, there are nine major processing
steps in three different sub-sections. This includes raw
material melting in the Pre-Mixing Section, deionized (DI)
water heating, and material blending in the Main Blending
Section, as well as filling, conveying, cartoning, shrink wrap-
ping, and shipment packaging in the Packaging sections. Due
to the capacity limitation of the pre-mixing vessel, the raw
material is divided into two sub-mix batches in the Pre-
Mixing Section. Two batches of Emulsifying Wax (ESW) and
Foam Stabilizer (FS) are independently heated in the heating
procedures P-1 (carried out in Jacketed Heater V-101) and P-
2 (in Jacketed Heater V-102) to approximately 100ºC before
the emulsifier (EMUL) and ointment (OIN) are added. The
emulsifier and ointment are originally in wax form and need
to be melted for uniform mixing. All raw materials are
charged at room temperature.
DI water is heated in the electric heater EH-101 (proce-
dure P-3) before being transferred into the Main Blending
Tank, V-103 (P-4) in the Main Blending Section. An Antimi-
crobial Agent (AM) is next added into the hot DI water,
followed by agitation for 10 minutes. The mixture in the
jacketed heater V-101 and V-102 is then transferred into V-
103. The mixture of all ingredients in V-103 is blended once
more for 15 minutes in order to produce a uniform composi-
tion. The mixture is then left in an air-conditioned dispensing
room to be naturally cooled to room temperature. This cooling
operation took approximately 19 hours to accomplish due to
the slow rate of natural cooling. Upon the completion of the
cooling operation, the Active Ingredient (AI) of the anti-
allergic cream is finally added. The products are once again
blended for 15 minutes to obtain uniform composition before
the product mixture is sent to the Packaging Section.
Upon the completion of the Main Blending Procedure, the
©Copyright ISPE 2006
Batch Process Simulation
Figure 3. Capacity, time and combined utilization for unit
procedures in base case simulation.
blended product is next transferred to Filler P-5/FL-101 in
the Packaging Section where it is filled into the tubes of 15 g
each. The existing filling machine is operated at a speed of 30
tubes/min. The tubes are then sent to the cartoning packag-
ing procedure P-7 (using a belt conveyer P-6/BC-101) where
the anti-allergic cream in tubes are packed manually by two
operators into the tube cartons, each at a speed of 20 cartons/
min. Next, 12 cartons of anti-allergic cream are packed into
one wrapper in the Shrink Wrapper (P-8/GBX-101) with a
speed of five wrappers/min. Finally, six wrappers are packed
into each of the pallet boxes in Packing Machine P-9/BX-102
(equivalent to 72 tubes/pallet box) before they are sent to the
warehouse. Approximately six sealed pallet boxes are packed
per minute by the operator manually.
As the manufacturing process is carried out in a batch
operation mode, efforts have been made to document the
scheduling details of each processing step. The Operation
Gantt Chart for the complete recipe of a single batch opera-
tion is shown in Figure 2. It also should be noted that the
process time for certain operations are dependant upon other
operations of other procedure (e.g., transfer-out operation in
P-4 is set equal to the filling duration of P-5). Hence, the
duration of this slave operation is set to follow to the duration
of the master operation using the Master-Slave Relationship
function.10 The customer demand for this anti-allergic cream
product is expected to rise another 150% of the current
production capacity in upcoming years. However, the process
is currently running at its maximum capacity and any at-
tempt to increase production is not possible due to the process
bottleneck. This calls for a systematic procedure to analyze
the current production facilities and next to debottleneck the
process. Apart from debottlenecking the current production,
the debottlenecking study also will develop solutions for
future expansion.
Bottleneck Identification Strategies
In the current operation, the annual operating time for the
anti-allergic cream manufacturing is taken as 2080 hours,
which is based on 52 operation weeks, five days a week and
eight hours operation per day. From the base case simulation,
a complete batch of pharmaceutical cream production is
found to have a process batch time of 40.2 hrs and a minimum
JULY/AUGUST 2006 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING 3
 Batch Process Simulation
Economic Parameters Base Case Scheme 1 Scheme 2 Scheme 3 Scheme 4 Scheme 5
Batch Production (tubes/batch) 13,333 13,333 13,333 13,333 13,333 13,333
Plant Batch Time (hour) 40.2 41.7 26.2 23.3 27.7 24.8
Minimum Cycle Time (hour) 29.0 21.6 15.0 12.0 9.9 7.6
Number of Batches/year 66 87 121 147 173 215
Annual Production (tube/yr) 880,000 1,160,000 1,613,300 1,960,000 2,306,600 2,866,600
Cost of Investment ($) - 10,000 255,000 555,000 265,000 565,000
Annual Operating Cost ($) 947,200 1,310,000 1,432,700 1,536,000 2,167,200 2,393,500
Unit Production Cost ($/tube) 2.30 1.13 0.89 0.78 0.94 0.83
Annual Revenue ($) 2,200,000 2,900,000 4,033,000 4,900,000 5,766,700 7,166,700
Gross Margin 57.0 54.9 64.5 68.7 62.7 66.6
Cost Benefit Ratio (CBR) - 1.88 2.47 2.36 2.40 2.47
Table A. Throughput and economic evaluation of base case study and various debottlenecking schemes.

cycle time of 29 hrs - Figure 2. The minimum cycle time of the
process is defined as the minimum time possible between the
start of two consecutive batches. It is equal to the longest
occupation time among all pieces of equipment involved in
this process.10 In the case of anti-allergic cream manufactur-
ing; the minimum cycle time corresponds to the prolonged
cooling operation in the Main Blending procedure P-4. With
an interval of two hours for tank cleaning between batches,
this sets the plant annual production at 66 batches. The
throughput of the base case is summarized in Table A (col-
umn 2). The simplest option to increase the process through-
put by increasing daily operating duration is determined to
be uneconomical due to the high operating cost in hiring
additional staff. This leads us to explore the use of combined
utilization concept as has been discussed earlier.
Figure 3 displays the capacity, time, and combined utiliza-
tion of all the procedure/equipment pairs in the base case
simulation. As shown, the Main Blending Procedure P-4 (V-
103) with an equipment capacity utilization of 89.9% and the
equipment uptime of 93.6% has a much higher combined
utilization percentage of 84.1% as compared to other proce-
dures. The high equipment uptime of this procedure is mainly
due to the long cooling operation (19 hours) and Transfer-Out
operation (8.4 hours). This also makes P-4/V-103 the sched-
uling bottleneck of the process, i.e., process with longest
operating duration (see Operation Gantt Chart in Figure 2).
Note that certain procedures (e.g. Filler P5/FL-101, Belt
Conveyer P-6/BC-101, etc.) are not considered as size bottle-
necks even though they have 100% size utilization, as the
operation speed of this equipment can be adjusted according
to the operational needs.5
After identifying the Main Blending Procedure P-4 (V-103)
as the first process bottlenecking candidate, debottlenecking
strategies will next be focused on reducing either the size or
time utilization of this procedure/equipment. However, since
there are two pre-mixing tanks that serve as the mixture
preparation proceeding to P-4/V-103, any attempt of changing
a larger Main Blending vessel will lead to the replacement of
the two pre-mixing tanks V-101 and V-102. This has been
determined by the management team to be an infeasible
option at the present moment. Hence, debottlenecking options
will only focus on the reduction of equipment uptime of P-4/V-
103. This is described in the next section.
Debottlenecking Schemes
After identifying the candidate for process debottlenecking,
the feasibility of various debottlenecking schemes were evalu-
ated. Five debottlenecking schemes were analyzed in which
all schemes were applied focusing on reducing the equipment
uptime of P-4/V-103 as the process time bottleneck.
Alternative Debottlenecking Schemes
Figure 4 shows the simulation flowsheet for debottlenecking
Scheme 1. As shown, a new intermediate tank V-104 is
installed after the Main Blending vessel. The main rationale
underlying this scheme is to reduce the equipment uptime of
Main Blending vessel (P-4/V-103), by spending a minimal
investment cost of US $10,000 (purchase cost for V-104). By
adding the intermediate tank V-104, the two subsequent
procedures P-4/V-103 and P-5/FL-101 are disconnected. The
Transfer-Out operation in P-4/V-103 is no longer constrained
by the slow filling operation in Filler P-5/FL-101. Upon the
completion on the blending operations in P-4/V-103, the
product mixture is transferred into the newly added V-104 for
temporary storage while waiting for the filling operation to
complete. The main blending procedure can then be carried
out for a subsequent operation. Simulation results showed
that the annual production for this scheme has increased to
87 batches due to the reduction of minimum cycle time that
limits the number of annual production from 29 hrs (in the
base case simulation) to 21.6 hrs (shown in the third column
in Table A). This corresponds to an increase of annual
production rate of 32%, but is insufficient to fulfill the
projected customer demand.
Scheme 2 for process debottlenecking is shown in Figure 5.
It focuses on the reduction of cooling operation of P-4/V-103
instead. A multifunctional blending tank with a cooling
system (purchase cost of US $255,000) is installed to replace
the main blending tank. This reduces the cooling time of the
product mixture from the current 19 hours to five hours.

4 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING JULY/AUGUST 2006 ©Copyright ISPE 2006

 Batch Process Simulation

Figure 4. Debottlenecking Scheme 1 with the installation of an intermediate tank.

Chilled water is used as cooling agent to cool the mixture from
85ºC to room temperature. This leads to the reduction of
minimum cycle time to 15 hrs. Hence, an increase of 83.3% is
achieved for annual production as compared to the base case,
i.e., from 66 to 121 batches (fourth column in Table C). From
Table B, it is shown that even although P-4/V-103 remains as
the overall process bottleneck, its combined utilization value
has actually been reduced from 84.2% in the base case
simulation to 79.3%, due to the reduction of its uptime. On the
other hand, combined utilization of other unit procedures
have increased significantly. This leads to an overall increase
of process throughput. Further debottlenecking can only be
achieved if the long duration of the Transfer-out operation in
P-4/V-103 (to filler P-5/FL-101) can be reduced.
Figure 6 shows the simulation flowsheet of Scheme 3 that
explores the reduction of P-4/V-103 uptime from a different
perspective. As the Transfer-Out duration of P-4/V-103 is
dependent upon the filling rate in P-5/FL-10, one alternative
to reduce the duration of Transfer-Out operation in P-4/V-103
is to install a high speed filler to shorten the filling duration
in P-5/FL-10, and hence the Transfer-out duration in P-4/V-
103. As shown in Figure 6, a new filler (50 tubes/min;
purchase cost of $300,000) is installed in addition to the new
multifunctional blending tank in Scheme 2 to accelerate the
filling rate. Simulation results showed that with the reduc-
tion of Transfer-out duration in P-4/V-103, combined utiliza-
tion values of P-4/V-103, P-5/FL-101 and P-6/BC-101 have
been reduced slightly, while other unit procedures increase in
their combined utilization values - Table B. The net result is
the reduction of minimum cycle time to 12 hrs and an increase
annual production rate of 147 batches, i.e., 122.7% compared
to the base case (fifth column in Table A).
Another debottlenecking alternative focusing on reducing
the overall uptime of P-4/V-103 is presented in Scheme 4 -
Figure 7. Instead of installing a new filling machine as in
Scheme 3, an intermediate storage tank (V-104; purchase
cost of US $10,000) is added in addition to the installation of
a new Blending Tank (P-4/V-103). This scheme exhibits the
same characteristics as the combination of Scheme 1 and
Scheme 2. Simulation results showed that the annual pro-
duction for this scheme is 173 batches with a minimum cycle
time reduced to 9.9 hrs (sixth column in Table A). This
corresponds to an increase of annual production rate of 162%,
fulfilling the future market demand. It also should be noted

Equipment Tag Procedure Name Base Case Scheme 1 Scheme 2 Scheme 3 Scheme 4 Scheme 5
V-102 P-2 Jacketed Heater 2 4.71 6.19 8.59 10.41 12.26 16.00
V-101 P-1 Jacketed Heater 1 8.04 10.56 14.66 17.76 20.92 27.30
V-103 P-4 Main Blending Tank 84.12 82.30 79.34 77.11 57.27 79.13
FL-101 P-5 Filler 27.13 35.65 49.48 38.81 70.61 56.81
BC-101 P-6 Belt Conveyor 23.90 31.41 43.60 31.68 62.21 46.38
BX-101 P-7 Manual Cartoning 17.93 23.56 32.70 39.60 46.66 57.97
GBX-101 P-8 Shrink Wrapping 11.95 15.70 21.80 26.40 31.10 38.65
BX-102 P-9 Manual Pallet Packaging 1.66 2.18 3.03 3.67 4.32 5.37
Table B. Combined utilization for different debottlenecking schemes.

©Copyright ISPE 2006 JULY/AUGUST 2006 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING 5

 Batch Process Simulation
Raw Material Symbol Price ($/kg) Unit/Batch Cost/Batch ($) Annual Cost ($) % Contribution
Emulsifier EMUL 15.50 30.00 kg 465.00 30,690.00 11.15
Emulsifying Wax ESW 5.05 3.60 kg 18.18 1,200.00 0.44
Foam Stable FS 3.00 14.40 kg 43.20 2,851.00 1.04
Antimicrobial Agent AM 4.00 0.24 kg 0.96 63.00 0.02
Active Ingredient AI 650.00 2.00 kg 1,300.00 85,800.00 31.17
Emulsifying Ointment OIN 15.00 12.00 kg 180.00 11,880.00 4.32
Deionized Water DI water 0.50 137.76 kg 68.88 4,546.00 1.65
Water Water 0.03 69.63 kg 2.09 138.00 0.05
Tube Tube 0.10 13,333.00 1,333.30 88,000.00 31.97
Carton Box Small box 0.05 13,333.00 666.65 44,000.00 15.98
Pallet Box Big box 0.50 185.00 92.50 6,110.00 2.22
TOTAL COST 3,635.44 239,939.06 100.00
Table C. Cost of raw material for base case simulation.

that after the installation of intermediate storage tank V-
101, filler P-5/FL-101 has became the unit procedure with the
highest combined utilization value. As shown in Table B, all
unit procedures experienced an increase in their combined
utilization values except that of P-4/V103. This is consistent
with the finding of Koulouris et al,5 where new bottleneck
equipment will emerge after the current bottleneck is over-
come. Debottlenecking efforts are stopped at this scheme as
the debottlenecking objective is reached, i.e., achieving the
150% increase in production as compared to current produc-
tion. However, to cater for future expansion plan as re-
quested by the management team, the replacement of a new
P-5/FL-101 is studied in the next debottlenecking scheme.
Figure 8 shows the simulation flowsheet for Scheme 5,
which includes filler P-5/FL-101 for debottlenecking. With
the presence of the additional intermediate tank and the high
speed filling machine, the production increases to 215 batches
per annum, i.e., an increase of 225% with minimum cycle time
reduced to 7.6 hr (seventh column in Table C). The capital
investment needed in this scheme is calculated as the sum-
mary of individual equipment in the previous schemes, i.e.
$565,000.
All the proposed debottlenecking schemes have demon-
strated significant improvement on the annual production
throughput. This is mainly due to the reduction of minimum
cycle time associated with main blending tank procedures. As
previously mentioned, Scheme 4 serves as the debottlenecking
scheme for current increase of production; while Scheme 5
with the highest process throughput is reserved for future
expansion plans.

Figure 5. Debottlenecking Scheme 2 with the installation of new multifunctional blending tank.

6 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING JULY/AUGUST 2006 ©Copyright ISPE 2006

 Batch Process Simulation

Figure 6. Debottlenecking Scheme 3 with the installation of new multifunctional blending tank and new filler.

Economic Evaluation
Preliminary economic evaluations are next carried out for the
base case simulation and each of the debottlenecking schemes.
This is done via the economic evaluation function of the
simulation software.10 In order to regenerate a realistic cost
estimate, raw material costs and equipment purchase costs
are obtained from local industrial suppliers. Table C shows
the cost of the raw material for the production of anti-allergic
cream and their contribution to the overall production cost in
the base case simulation. The active ingredient for the anti-
allergic cream and the tube (where 15 g of cream is filled)
dominate the raw material cost, each contributing 31% of the
overall production cost. Note that the distribution of raw
material costs remains the same for all schemes as shown in
Table C, only differing by total annual cost for each scheme
due to the different annual throughput.
The economic evaluation comparing the various
debottlenecking schemes with respect to the base case study
is shown in Table A. The Cost Benefit Ratio (CBR) is used as
a tool in comparing the alternative schemes. As shown,
except for Scheme 1, all other debottlenecking schemes are
having similar CBR values with Scheme 2 and Scheme 5

Figure 7. Debottlenecking Scheme 4 with the installation of intermediate tank and new multifunctional blending tank.

©Copyright ISPE 2006 JULY/AUGUST 2006 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING 7

 Batch Process Simulation
Figure 8. Debottlenecking Scheme 5 for future plant expansion.
having the highest value of 2.47. This indicates that except
for Scheme 1 all debottlenecking schemes have equal value
for investment.
In the previous debottlenecking section, it is shown that
Scheme 4 was selected to be the debottlenecking scheme due to
its fulfillment to future customer demand, i.e., by producing
more than 150% of the current production. On the other hand,
Scheme 5 that has been identified to be the future debottlenecking
scheme also shows a promising CBR value of 2.47.
Conclusion
In this work, Computer-Aided Process Design (CAPD) and
simulation tools are used in the systematic identification of the
process bottleneck and a debottlenecking study. An operational
pharmaceutical case study of anti-allergic cream production is
used to demonstrate the effectiveness of the tools. The base case
and four debottlenecking schemes are simulated using SuperPro
Designer. The annual process throughput is increased signifi-
cantly with the reduction of equipment uptime of the process
time bottleneck. The study produced a debottlenecking scheme
that achieves the current production needs, with a scheme that
will cater for a future expansion plan.
References
1. Westerberg, A. W., Hutchison, H. P., Motard, R. L., and
Winter, P., Process Flowsheeting, Cambridge: Cambridge
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Study,” Biotechnology and Bioengineering, 48, 1995, pp.
529-541.
3. Hwang, F., “Batch Pharmaceutical Process Design and
Simulation,” Pharmaceutical Engineering, January/Feb-
ruary 1997, pp. 28-43.
8 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING JULY/AUGUST 2006
4. Ernst, S., Garro, O. A., Winkler, S., Venkataraman, G.,
Langer R., Cooney, C. L., and Sasisekharan, R., “Process
Simulation for Recombinant Protein Production: Cost
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ceutical Engineering, Vol. 24, No. 6, 2004, pp. 42-60.
9. Blank, L. T. and Tarquin A. J., Engineering Economy,
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Acknowledgement
The authors would like to thank Dr. Alexandros Koulouris,
the Managing Director of Intelligen Europe, for his construc-
tive feedback with this project.
©Copyright ISPE 2006

About the Authors
Jully Tan is a research student at the Chemi-
cal Engineering Pilot Plant, Universiti
Teknologi Malaysia (CEPP, UTM). She re-
ceived her BEng degree in chemical engi-
neering from the Universiti Teknologi Ma-
laysia and is currently pursuing her MSc
research work in CEPP, UTM. She conducted
her industrial attachment at a local pharma-
ceutical production plant where this project is carried out. At
the plant, she assisted the plant management team to evalu-
ate different debottlenecking schemes for various pharma-
ceutical production processes using computer-aided process
simulation tools. She can be contacted via e-mail:
tanjully@yahoo.co.uk or by phone: +60(12)-6670382.
Chemical Engineering Pilot Plant, Universiti Teknologi
Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia.
Dominic C. Y. Foo is an Assistant Professor
at the University of Nottingham Malaysia.
Prior to this position, he served as a Post-
graduate Researcher at the Chemical Engi-
neering Pilot Plant, Universiti Teknologi
Malaysia (CEPP, UTM), where this work
was completed. He obtained his BEng, MEng,
and PhD from the Universiti Teknologi Ma-
laysia, all in chemical engineering. His main areas of work
include that of process synthesis, analysis, and design for
cleaner production and efficient manufacturing. He makes
use of computer-aided process design and simulation tools in
optimizing and debottlenecking batch manufacturing pro-
cesses, such as pharmaceutical, fine, and specialty chemical
production. He is a member of the Institution of Engineers,
Malaysia (IEM) and the Institution of Chemical Engineers
UK (IChEM) Malaysia Branch, previously known as the
Institution of Chemical Engineers Malaysia (IChEM). He
can be contacted via e-mail: Dominic.Foo@nottingham.edu.my
or foodominic@ yahoo.com, by phone: +60(03)-89248130, or
by fax: +60(03)-89248017. His personal Web site is http://
www.geocities.com/foodominic/.
School of Chemical and Environmental Engineering, Uni-
versity of Nottingham Malaysia Campus, Broga Rd., 43500
Semenyih, Selangor, Malaysia.
©Copyright ISPE 2006
Batch Process Simulation
Sivakumar Kumaresan is a lecturer in
chemical engineering at the Universiti Ma-
laysia Sabah. He has a BS in chemical engi-
neering from Texas A&M University (US),
an MSc in advanced control from the Univer-
sity of Manchester Institute of Science and
Technology (UK), and is currently complet-
ing his PhD in herbal processing at the Chemi-
cal Engineering Pilot Plant, Universiti Teknologi Malaysia.
His area of work includes the application of process simula-
tion tools to pharmaceutical modelling and he is currently
working on model-based phytochemical processing design
and optimization focusing on the standarization of herbal
extracts for pharmaceutical applications. He can be con-
tacted via e-mail: shiva@ums.edu.my or shiva@cepp.utm.my,
by phone: +60(88)-320000 ext. 3064, or by fax: +60(88)-
320348.
Chemical Engineering Program, School of Engineering
and Information Technology, Universiti Malaysia Sabah,
Locked Bag 2073, 88999, Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia.
Ramlan A. Aziz is a Professor and Director
of the Chemical Engineering Pilot Plant,
Universiti Teknologi Malaysia. He obtained
his BEng and MEng from the University of
Manchester Institute of Science and Tech-
nology (UMIST, UK). His main areas of work
include developing small and medium scale
enterprises in Malaysia through process and
product development based on natural products and
bioprocessing. He is a member of the Filtration Society of UK
and has served as a Vice President for Institution of Chemical
Engineers Malaysia (IChEM). He can be contacted via e-
mail: ramlan@cepp.utm.my, by phone: +60(07)-5531662 or
by fax: +60(07)-5569706. His Web site is http://www.cepp.
utm.my/.
Chemical Engineering Pilot Plant, Universiti Teknologi
Malaysia, 81310 Skudai, Johor, Malaysia.
JULY/AUGUST 2006 PHARMACEUTICAL ENGINEERING 9